


First Word

by bluesyone



Category: Onward - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-18 21:55:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28874190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluesyone/pseuds/bluesyone
Summary: Judy says her first word, and it surprises both Ian and Laurel.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	First Word

The more Ian babysat little Judy, the less he wanted to be a parent. Sure, she's a little miracle, and she's adorable. But when she wasn't smiling or cooing or being all around cute, she was a painful gross factory. She smelled, she was sticky, she made messes, she threw tantrums. She screamed, she didn't just cry, she wailed. And it was as if she never slept. What's worse was baby centaurs were walking days after birth, so the elftaur was always on the move, had to constantly be watched. Ian was only caring for her a few hours a week, and he was a wreck times two. It got so bad that he even started apologizing to Laurel for being a baby. Laurel just laughed it off, claiming that Ian was a much more behaved baby. Ian doubted that, he could only imagine what a nightmare he was.

One day, Ian came home from school, and it was a terrible day. Three tests, two pop quizzes, and despite being a popular wizard those jocks in pe tried to gang up on him in the lockers again. He flopped his backpack down, placed his staff by the front door and made a beeline to the kitchen. He began making a cup of coffee (yup, so bad a day he needed a cup in the afternoon) and started making a peanut butter sandwich for a snack.

As he began spreading the jelly, he could hear the clip clop of little hooves on tile. Ian groaned to himself, but closed his eyes and reminded himself, it's just Judy, it's just Judy.

Ian looked down as he felt Judy tug on his pantleg. She was making a small noise while pointing up at the counter. "What's that, Judy? You hungry?" Ian took a quick bite of his sandwich and whipped up some formula. He knelt down and began to feed her from a bottle like he was bottle feeding a baby horse. Judy was too big for Ian to pick up, being part centaur.

After feeding Judy, Ian went to the living room and ate his sandwich. He was halfway through his cup of coffee when he leaned back on the couch and closed his eyes. He just needed a minute before he got to his homework. Just close his eyes, listen to his slow breathing and the little cockatrice chirp outside in the bushes.

His moment of calm was interrupted by a loud crash. Ian sat up and caught Judy by the coffee table, apparently just got done knocking over his empty plate and it broke on the floor. "Judy!" he shouted, both in aggravation and fear she hurt herself.

Judy cried from the shouting, giving that strange hiccuping like sound between her wails. Ian sighed, trying to get it together before comforting her. Once she began to calm, and Ian found she wasn't hurt from breaking the plate, he helped Judy into her play pen, which was more like a small actual pen as it took up so much of a corner of the living room. Ian picked up the big pieces of china, then went to vaccuming. He tried to ignore Judy's crying from the vacuum, there's nothing he could do about her being scared of the noise.

Once the mess was cleaned up, Ian took his backpack into the living room and sat down on the couch. He cracked open a textbook and began studying, deciding he should study in the living room while he periodically checked up on little Judy. The little elftaur was settling down in her playpen, chewing on a teething ring, while sometimes muttering that strange sound again.

Trying to concentrate, Ian pulled out his smartphone and plugged his earbuds into his long pointy ears. He went back to his work, trying to concentrate on his history textbook. Yes, he's gotten a newfound interest in history since his quest. But the more the chapters rolled into more modernized history with less lore and magic, the less he cared about his history class again. It made earning that A such a chore.

He was in the middle of highlighting a paragraph when he felt something tug on his sleeve, ruining that perfect yellow line across the sentence. As he looked up, he felt his earbuds get yanked out of his ear. "Ow, what the- Judy?" he asked, surprised to see the curious elftaur out of her pen. He looked over to see the pen open. It was open? Judy opened it? Oh no, Judy's old and smart enough to open her own play pen?

Judy pressed her teething ring against Ian's calf, her warm saliva seeping through Ian's denim pantleg. "Judy, ew, ugh." Ian was about to lose it. "Barley?" Ian called out, trying to get someone's attention. "Mom? Colt?"

Laurel came downstairs. "Ian? Hey, you're home."

"Yeah, can you watch Judy?" Ian asked. "I'm trying to study."

Laurel knelt down to pick up Judy's teething ring and play with Judy. "Sorry, she must have wandered off on me."

Ian grabbed his textbook, finished his coffee, placed his cup in the kitchen sink and went to his and Barley's bedroom. Barley wouldn't be home for another hour, so he better enjoy having their bedroom to himself. He tossed his textbook onto his desk and floors into his desk chair. Instead of getting back to work, Ian gave a long exhausted sigh. He felt bad for being short with mom. Judy didn't mean to be a handful, she was just a baby.

"Ian?" Laurel called out from the other room.

Ian gave an exhale. Mom must be reminding him to take care of his dishes. He left the bedroom, went back to the kitchen sink, and rinsed out his coffee mug before putting it in the dishwasher.

"Ian!" Laurel called out again.

"What?" Ian called back.

"Come here!" she said again, almost pleading for his attention.

Ian went running. Did he miss a piece of plate? Did Judy trip over his backpack? No, Judy and Laurel were just fine. Laurel was sitting on the floor with Judy. Ian finally sat down next to them. "What?"

"Oh thank goodness you're here, listen," Laurel said quickly and excitedly.

Ian was quiet for a minute as Laurel encouraged Judy to repeat herself. Instead, Judy said that strange little cooing noise again. "Yeah, she's cooing, so?" Ian asked, confused.

"No, listen," Laurel replied. She went back to encouraging Judy again, this time emphasizing when she pointed to Ian.

Judy looked over, then up at Ian. "Een."

Ian's eyes widened a bit, his eyebrows perked up curiously. Wait, that sounded almost like a word...

"Say it again," Laurel said softly, excitedly to little Judy.

Judy placed her little blue hand on Ian's knee. "Een."

Ian softly gasped.

A happy tear escaped from Laurel's eye. "That's right. That's Ian."

Ian's face lit up in surprise and awe. "I'm... I'm her first word?"

Judy fumbled a bit as she laid down her horse half, her elfin upper half sitting up, then leaning forward as both her hands planted on Ian's hand. "Een."

Ian gave a soft exhale from his proud smile, tears of joy pooling atop his cheeks. His hand gently took Judy's little blue hand and held it firmly but lovingly.

Maybe being a parent isn't going to be as bad as Ian thought.

**Author's Note:**

> This Judy's first word fanfic also plays with the plausible headcanon that Ian may not like babies. He likes kids, and to an extent babies, but he doesn't like how gross and annoying babies can be. Because of this, he doesn't think he could be a parent. Thankfully, this milestone in Judy's life shows Ian that having babies isn't all that bad. And I bet if he found the right partner to handle the gross things, he'd make a really good parent.
> 
> A last note, yes Ian does call Colt by his name in this. Another headcanon I have is it's gonna take some time before Ian and Barley start calling Colt "dad" and Ian will start calling Colt dad before Barley does. So this is either before Ian started calling him dad, or he slipped up. I'm assuming the latter, cause I thought Ian would start calling him dad around the time Colt and Laurel got married.


End file.
